Where do people find the money to buy such expensive houses?

Mr Joe

I don't want to take this off topic but it must really gall people who spend that much on a house and work that hard, and then you get Joe Bloggs around the corner given his free council house who doesn't work at all.

If it was me it would sicken me badly. I'm not sure how that works in proper functioning places Britain and the US. It's another reason that makes it preferable to live abroad than here. You don't get rewarded for that hard work here, you get taxed out of existence to fund the lifestyles of others and in the end you probably aren't much better off than people who play the Council House waiting game.

Walter2016

Mr Joe wrote: »

I don't want to take this off topic but it must really gall people who spend that much on a house and work that hard, and then you get Joe Bloggs around the corner given his free council house who doesn't work at all.

If it was me it would sicken me badly. I'm not sure how that works in proper functioning places Britain and the US. It's another reason that makes it preferable to live abroad than here. You don't get rewarded for that hard work here, you get taxed out of existence to fund the lifestyles of others and in the end you probably aren't much better off than people who play the Council House waiting game.

Not really - joe bloggs won't be earning great wages, he wouldn't be able to do much to the house, has to pay rent relative to earnings and can't really move location.

And of course doesn't benefit from any appreciation in price nor can the house be passed on to other family members.

Btw - you say "proper functioning places like UK and USA" eh, i suggest you check both out. "unfunctioning" would be a more apt word - one look at a usa trailer park will tell you that.

irishguy

As people have already said there are a number of very well paying jobs in the Dublin area in IT, Finance, Accounting etc. A large number (12/15 people) people I know (mostly in IT/Accounting) with C.10 years experience are on €70/90k (excluding pension/bonus) some of which have a spouse on the same money or more (in a few cases). So 2 first time buyers on a joint €140,000 would be allow you to borrow €490k + deposit.
Its still a lot of money and is the top 10% of earners, it's just mostly concentrated in the Dublin area, in the rest of Ireland it would be quite rare to get that level of earnings.

newacc2015

A lot of people outside of Dublin are obvious to how wealthy Dublin is. I visited a family member down in a regional city and I went to the city centre for Christmas Eve. I was so shocked at how different it was to Dublin. So few people had shopping bags and very few were actually buying anything. Versus Christmas Eve in Dublin City where everyone is covered in several bags a lot of which is luxury items. I was over in London during the Summer and there was less displays of wealth than Dublin. If you stand for 5 mins on Grafton or Baggot St, you will see several people with several thousand hand bags. Dublin is a very wealthy city, there is just so much poverty that it is hard to see the wealth at times. This not my opinion, the EU has plenty of surveys on income that put Dublin as one of the richest regions in Europe and the West and midlands is generally below average EU income

Dublin is the centre of aviation finance for the world. The average salary for this is about €150k in some firms. The average chartered accountant is about €100k per year. Most of the big 4 work is done in Dublin despite having offices outside of Dublin. The IFSC has a ton of extremely well paid jobs. Then there is the all IT companies who often have their largest operations outside of America in Dublin. A lot of their managers would be Irish. Most well paid jobs in Ireland are in Dublin.

I know two people who are a year out of college, one working in IT sales and another working as an engineer in a pharmaceutical. Both are on about €65-75k. Massive salaries in Dublin are not abnormal if you are educated and have an in demand skill

Dial Hard

Ursus Horribilis wrote:

Short term pain for a longer term gain perhaps?

It really depends on how much people are willing to sacrifice for a few bob. Last year I was given the opportunity to work in the UAE for 1-3 years (I could choose how long I stayed). Tax-free, accommodation included, two flights home annually paid for and a completion bonus of two months salary per year worked when I finished up. I turned it down. For me it just wasn't worth giving up all the things I take for granted as a woman living in Ireland.

sparky63

Short term pain for a longer term gain perhaps. If one can buy with cash, no debts.

Otherwise!

More like Short term gain for a longer term pain.

Timistry

aido79 wrote: »

I personally know a few Irish people earning that sort of money in Australia. They are working in mining/oil and gas and their living expenses would be quite low as they work away for 4 weeks at a time and only really need to spend money on their week off.
The highest rate of tax at 45% doesn't kick in until a person earns $180,000 a year.
Believe me some of these guys( the ones who aren't stupid with their money) are saving massive amounts of money.

Agree 100% All living and work expenses covered. Many actually live in Asia paying $50 a week rent and living like a king off of maybe twice that...

People say its expensive but your tax is spent wisely,you have entitlements and there is no tv licence, rip off car tax and insurance, health insurance etc

Muahahaha

Another growth area of well paid jobs is Irish people being promoted to director level of American MNCs. Companies that established their European base here in the early 2000s now have local employees with 10-15 years experience in the same company and theyre climbing the ladder onto boards where salaries over €250k can be common plus share options too.

ongarboy

Muahahaha wrote: »

Another growth area of well paid jobs is Irish people being promoted to director level of American MNCs. Companies that established their European base here in the early 2000s now have local employees with 10-15 years experience in the same company and theyre climbing the ladder onto boards where salaries over €250k can be common plus share options too.

You don't have to be promoted to director level in MNCs to earn decent salaries to afford the houses the OP is querying. I work in the funds industry which employs 1000s in Dublin alone and anyone who reaches Assistant Vice President (AVP) grade or higher is easily on 50/60K or more per annum. My last two companies had over a 100 AVPs each so that gives a snapshot on how common decent salaries are. Most large funds employers have dozens of such grade employees along with the higher Vice Presidents, Senior VPs and then Executive VPs (all on 100K+ salaries).

Combine that with their partners on either modest or good salaries, and the houses that OP queries are easily affordable through mortgages or accumulated savings over the years (particular staff bonuses in the form of shares that are tax free after 3 years apart from capital gains tax) and you have many people with decent assets built up. I'm only speaking for the sector I work in but the insurance, accountancy, institutional and retail banking and all the other professional sector occupations have many employees in those well paid salary brackets also. If you acquire a 3rd level university degree as most young people do these days, work hard and display a good ethic and get promoted multiple times over your formative years, the opportunities are there to earn good money.

power pants

Walter2016 wrote: »

Not really - joe bloggs won't be earning great wages, he wouldn't be able to do much to the house, has to pay rent relative to earnings and can't really move location.

And of course doesn't benefit from any appreciation in price nor can the house be passed on to other family members.

Btw - you say "proper functioning places like UK and USA" eh, i suggest you check both out. "unfunctioning" would be a more apt word - one look at a usa trailer park will tell you that.

it is passed to the next generation if their name is on the floor. Even less incentive for that family to ever work creating generations of useless lazy dummies for tax payers to support.

Personally, I think people who dont work and have no reason not to be working should be in prison or even worse

Oink

power pants wrote: »

Personally, I think people who dont work and have no reason not to be working should be in prison or even worse

You might want to rephrase. It sounds a bit silly, like you mean it or something.

power pants

I do 100%

JuliusCaesar

power pants wrote: »

it is passed to the next generation if their name is on the floor. Even less incentive for that family to ever work creating generations of useless lazy dummies for tax payers to support.

So the three children grow up and move their partners into the one house with the parents and then each of the three families have children, and all of them in the same house forever? It just doesn't make sense.

power pants wrote: »

Personally, I think people who dont work and have no reason not to be working should be in prison or even worse

So everyone can work who isn't ill or mentally or physically handicapped? How does drug addiction or alcohol addiction count? Or ship them off to prison too?
How about a sink culture, sink schools, denigration by everyone, and no employment given to a person with x address? I dunno. Anyway, it's very expensive to keep someone in prison, and I believe the biggest education got there is in crime.


But then (back on topic) there's BIG houses to rob!

SEPT 23 1989

is poverty a crime?:D